


self-sacrifice

by exprsslyfrbidden



Category: Warrior Nun (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Near Death Experiences, and the, fallenhalo, it's not that graphic but the warning is there anyways because there are, that comes with that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:53:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26563924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exprsslyfrbidden/pseuds/exprsslyfrbidden
Summary: Ava had known without question, after those suffocating minutes in Adriel’s tomb, that she was going to give her life up to protect her sisters. She was to be the last Halo-Bearer. Lilith refuses to accept that.
Relationships: Sister Lilith/Ava Silva
Comments: 6
Kudos: 75





	self-sacrifice

**Author's Note:**

> brief scene that got stuck in my head and felt coherent enough to post.

Ava is dying. _Again_. 

This time's for real, no take backs; between her fingers she can feel the pulse of her life slipping, warming the cold stone. A hot circle burns at the nape of her neck. She can hear the Halo whining in her ear, straining, but her wounds reach too deep, cut too many important things. Not even divinity can pull her broken pieces together. She has often felt emotions gut-wrenching, but now hilariously can feel her guts themselves, and it’s wet. _Hurts._ Every fiber of her being is thrown towards the effort to stay together, to wrangle her thoughts away from the fact that she can’t feel the sword in her hand, can’t feel _anything_ except the dull agony that consumes her torso until she is nothing but a being of pain. She is torn, she is rent asunder. Immolated in anguish. 

Distantly, even as her senses are failing, she hears footsteps. Quick, skidding on stone. 

The sounds occurring outside her heavy breaths resolve slowly in her mind. “Ava,” someone is saying. Huh. That’s her name. _“Ava,”_ comes again, and this is a different pain—there is a torment in this person’s voice, a tight desperation going breathless. She opens her eyes. 

The action is crusty. There’s blood dried on her forehead, trailing down the side of her nose, and it itches. The figure kneeling at her side is silver-haired, and Ava knows those eyes, dark and wracked with worry. “Hey,” she croaks. The single word tears her apart again. The world fractures, red-framed. Another hand joins hers, futile against the open gash in her side, and she winces, groans at the pain. 

“You’re so fucking _stupid,”_ Lilith hisses, voice cracking with something that isn’t anger. A cool drip of liquid sears into Ava’s side. There are inexplicable shining tracks down Lilith’s cheeks. “Don’t you know I can’t—” She chokes. Her shoulders fold in and her back hunches, collapsing in on herself in a terrifying entropy that doesn’t belong to her. Lilith doesn’t collapse. Lilith is always strong, back straight; Lilith is unyielding and Lilith is honed edge. Not a mangled voice, thick with tears. “I didn’t go to hell so you could sacrifice _yourself_.” 

“I know,” Ava rasps. Her gaze goes past Lilith, to the fallen angel, the biblical thief thrown blood-eagled against cobblestone. Adriel’s black ichor is dry now. Still. Her own blood is too vibrant, pumping fast, stupidly desperate to escape her own body like how desperate she once was to escape her own fate. As that ruby liquid seeps through her fingers she realizes, crookedly amused, that running away had only been hurting herself. This is her place now, fighting to the last against that which would destroy what is good. She looks up at Lilith, her shining eyes and strong grip. This is her family now. “I’m fine,” she says, but even the accompanying smile stretches at some unseen wound and turns into a grimace. She tries anyway, trembling fingers searching for Lilith’s hand. “I love you.” 

“No,” Lilith snaps, little flickers of silver flame licking along her fingers. It’s warm, soothingly so. “Take that _back_ , Ava Silva. You do _not_ get to confess your love and then die on me. That’s—don’t be an _asshole.”_

Ava’s laugh peters into a hacking cough. Each breath stings like fire is reaching fingers into her lungs, searing her insides. “Hey, I’m not dying yet,” she whispers, even as it becomes difficult to keep her eyes open. A heavy tug of drowsiness surges over her. “Might take a nap, real quick…” 

Claws dig into her side and the brilliant white-hot flash of pain yanks her back to consciousness like she’s a fish hooked on a line. “Fuck,” she gasps, back arching. Caught on this thin thread of agony that’s dragging her to air, to life. She doesn’t want it. She wants to sink back into the dull silent water, close her eyes and let it wash her away. 

“Ava, stay _with_ me.” Oh. There’s another thread here, besides the pain. The twisting desperation that threatens to tangle Lilith’s words also is tied around the frantic squeeze of her heart, trying to keep her alive. Lilith’s voice cracks. Ava stares up at her, uncomprehending. _“Please,_ Ava. I can’t lose you. I can’t.” 

She’s crying. Lilith is crying and Ava is dying. Only one of these things should be happening. “I’m sorry.” The Halo is deadly silent behind her. She’s out of power, out of second, third, fourth chances. “You”—a hacking cough, she tastes iron—“sacrificed yourself for me. Even though you barely knew me.” Lilith’s palm is burning, searing against the open tear in her body. Ava smiles at her through the pain. “I know _you_ , now. And you deserve to live.” 

Lilith’s grip and voice tighten. “So do _you,_ Ava— _goddammit_ —”

She is hot now, like molten rock, brimstone. Ava can’t feel anything except the heat of Lilith’s hands, burning hotter, fiercer, a delicious pain that wracks her body and rips air from her throat. Now this—this is immolation. Someone is screaming in her torn voice, someone is holding down her broken body as it jerks and spasms. 

Her last thought wants to be of relief. It is instead of guilt. She knows too well what it feels like to be left behind in the world of the living, alone and plagued with ghosts. Is it fair of her to foist that burden on others? On _Lilith?_

It is too late for regret. She’s floating, sinking, succumbing. She is silence. 

* * *

Lilith sits and stares at the raw red handprints branded into Ava’s stomach, scar tissue veined with the silvery lines of her own fingerprints, the creases of her palms, until the image persists even behind her closed eyelids.

It’s no cutesy paint handprint for an elementary school art project, no; Lilith’s hands are burned into Ava’s skin in a unholy amalgamation of fingers and palms, too many fingers growing out of the shape of her hands, stitches stretched to keep the wound closed. Even the jagged gashes of Adriel’s last strike are faint beneath the marks of Lilith’s hands on Ava’s skin. Like the prickle of a limb asleep, Lilith can still feel that fire simmering beneath her skin, itching for something to consume. She clenches her fists now to feel the pulse of blood in her fingertips (that's what humans feel, heartbeats) and trains her gaze on the steady rise and fall of Ava’s chest. 

Hours must parade past—or they must, because hunger and thirst grow—but Lilith is only aware of the persistence of Ava’s breathing. Night has fallen. Or perhaps it’s the hour before dawn. Darkness clouds the room and Lilith’s heart nearly stops beating when Ava speaks, voice hoarse and scratchy. “Hey, my eyes are up here.”

Lilith starts up and is at Ava’s side in milliseconds. “Ava,” she breathes, and the crooked smile that she receives settles the stinging in her palms. “How do you feel?”

“Like I died,” she groans, trying to sit up and failing. Lilith reaches out, supports her back and helps her up. “What...what happened?”

The snarled storm of words suddenly comes untangled, a slipknot tugged free. Lilith stares at Ava. “You said you loved me,” she says, “and then you stopped breathing.”

“Oh.” Ava stares sightlessly ahead, then jolts with a memory. She pulls her shirt up. Lilith watches the sharp intake of breath, the morbid curiosity and apprehension crawling over Ava’s face. She reaches out, hesitant, traces a fingertip along the shapes on her skin. She looks over and takes Lilith’s hand. Together, Ava guiding, they match Lilith’s hands to the scabbing marks. “You saved me,” Ava murmurs.

Lilith imagines she can feel the pulse of Ava’s life beneath her palm. She locks certainty in that fact and finally lets anger spill off her tongue. “Don’t you _ever._ Dare do that again,” she says, voice tight and furious, “because that was _cowardly_ and _foolish_ and _you left me._ You—” Ava is looking at her with a rueful sorrow, brown eyes glistening, and her expression is like a pin to the burgeoning balloon of grief and anger. The heartrending rage flees her, leaves her empty. Her voice splinters. “You left me behind,” Lilith whispers. “You left me _alone_.”

Ava wipes tears from Lilith’s cheeks with her thumb. “I know sorry isn’t enough, but it’s all I’ve got right now.” She’s crying a little too, eyes glassy. “I’m sorry.”

“Promise me,” Lilith manages, because sometime earlier she had started to sob and not noticed it, “promise me you won’t do it again. _Please,_ Ava.” 

Ava nods tightly, mouth pressed firm to keep her voice steady. “I promise.” She pulls Lilith in, carefully, and nestles her head in the crook of her shoulder. “I promise.”

And she sounds so certain that Lilith has no choice but to believe her. “Also,” she sniffles, clinging to Ava, “saying ‘I love you’ like that was probably the worst possible way to do so. Did you think that would make me feel _better_ about losing you?”

Ava chuckles weakly. “Uh. I gotta admit, I wasn’t really thinking at that point. I just... _needed_ to say it. I needed you to know.” She presses a kiss to Lilith’s temple. “I’m sorry for that, too. Can I get a restart? Forget I said it that way?” 

Lilith laughs through her tears, wants to say _that’s not how life works,_ but Ava sounds so hopeful and they both have torn apart the definition of how life should work until it’s nothing but shreds. “Yes. You get a restart. Don’t waste it.” She can feel the curve of Ava’s smile in her ear, her soft sigh.

“Thank you.” 

Lilith knows that in a few minutes the rest of the sisters will be there, exclaiming over Ava and trying to piece themselves back together. She knows that there is no easy fix for the trauma and the wounds that ache long after they’ve healed. But they’re alive, and together, and for now—this is enough.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm slowly working up lots of thoughts about these two. also you can blame KtheG for the fact that the first thing i wrote for them was angst :P


End file.
